Hah! Restaurants too. That's my main issue. Bars, yeah. They're not health clubs, you know what you're getting into when you go in there. But restaurants....man, I just wanna enjoy a meal without coming home smelling like I went to a bar.

Everywhere you hear the call for more government, and more government surveillance, and more powers for governments, and government, government über alles. What many people outside government do not want to see, and what many people in government carefully hide form the public is that governments compete with each other for dominating other, weaker governments in other places and organizations. It is a ruinous competition that eliminates the number of competitors slowly, but surely, by stronger ones swallowing weaker ones. In the end, there can be only one government, a one-world-government. And ladies and gentleman, I present to you the inevitable truth: this one government will not be the government of a free people, but will be a complete and total and absolute dictatorship.

Do not worry, if you are in line with its ideology, you have nothing to fear, like no law-abiding citizens has to fear laws. And if you still get a headache over your doubts, the market for psychopharmaka becomes more and more a wild-west-fashioned anything-goes-arena all the time, I'm sure there is a happiness pill that gives even you the chemical club that you need to bear life and to function as is demanded of you.

While we are at it:

LINK: US gives big secret push to internet surveillance

LINK: Explanation of 2511 letters

LINK: The white House's claim

Wer's glaubt wird seelig!

Money has always been power.
The golden rule: those with the gold make the rules.
The founding fathers of this country were the richest men in this country.
Money always talks. People who got elected on the "Terms Limits" platform soon dropped that thought as soon as they were elected.
Obama was just a good guy in the hood, then suddenly he was a senator, then he was president. I wonder what kind of money is behind him?
The constitution in their mind is:
"and that government of the government, by the government, for the government, shall not perish from the earth.”:rock:

Anywhere between 11.8 and 12.2 million dollars, depending on where you look. "Good guy in the hood"? That's a load of crock. He's a millionaire Politician from Chicago.

Like the majority of senators: two thirds (67%) in 2011.

Like roughly the half of congress,47%, in 2011.

With the 113th congress being again wealthier than the previous one, by median net worth.

Which only proves my point. What makes Bloomberg different, is he is projecting and pushing a dangerous agenda and will stop at nothing.

A friend of mine is running for a State House position in Virginia. This is a part time position that pays about $17,000 per year.

In order to run for this office, he told me that he has to raise $1,000,000 for his campaign. For a small part time job as state house member.

He then told me that in the very near future, for the same position, it will probably cost $5,000,000.

That is one of the problems with politics. It costs so much money to run a campaign that the candidate has to get the money from somewhere. Local donations won't cover it so they turn to the Political Party for funds. Multiple strings are attached at multiple places.

It really should not cost a million dollars to run for a state assembly position. But it does. And the funding race keeps getting bigger and bigger.

You will have a tougher time winning an election by spending $500,000 if your opponent is spending $1,000,000. So you might as well spend $1,000,000. Then next election your opponent spends $1,500,000. Wadda goin to do?

There is no such thing as string-less donations. :nope:

I don't know what the solution is, or whether any solution may be worse then the disease.

But if you have to spend $1,000,000 to get a $17,000 part time job, that opens up a lot of potential for corruption. :nope:

If it costs 1 million in a state such as Virgina then in a large state such as California,Florida,New York and Texas the money needed for a campaign must be higher. I bet it costs 10 to 20 million in a state with a large population.

I know for certain here in Florida there is a lot of wealth in some hands but of course these persons represent a small portion of the population.All the money is in Broward,Dade and West Palm Beach county or at least the majority of the private money is.

$68 million for our recent Warren v Brown senate race. And that doesn't count the millions spend by PAC's.

Was that a state or national seat?sorry I do not know anything about Ma. politics.My impression was that Platapus was talking about state level seats.

I was referring to state level campaigns not those headed for D.C.

At any rate one million dollars is too much for a state office campaign.

Yes he was but they follow the same pattern. That was a record btw.

The late Senate election in FL the one the Marko Rubio won cost only counting the top three contenders and rounding off $42.5 million.

This page if accurate implies that we are both wrong MA did have the most expensive race.
http://www.opensecrets.org/overview/topraces.php

FL was king of the hill for House seats.


Notice how most of the money is spent in the biggest Blue and Red states?


What a farce the whole thing.

Don't I known it, I'm living next to the Intercostal and all I've got to is go outside and look across the water. There's at least five or six mansions that are visible, just Google Hypoluxo Island.

Well I only used that term because he was just a nobody at one point and living in a mansion the next. Someone was pumping money into the cause that's for sure.